21 June, 2012

Euro Docs Dominate At Silverdocs

VIRGINAL TALES (Switzerland/Germany/France)

by Sandy Mandelberger, North American Editor

The flowering of European documentaries is in clear evidence
at this year’s AFI-Discovery Channel
Silverdocs Documentary Festival. With what have been strong local funding
support and the financial involvement of state-run television, documentarians
have been able to take advantage of a wealth of resources to produce works that
are not only intriguing but artistically inventive. Of course, the completed
films on view here this week were committed to before the current pressure on
the European Community. Austerity measures across the continent are slashing
cultural budgets and film funding is among its biggest casualties. How European
filmmakers will cope is still an open question but for the moment, at least, we
have a bumper crop of films to relish and enjoy.

Silverdocs offers
a competition for strictly non-American films, and many of the strongest Euro
docs are to be seen in the Sterling World Features section. A
number of the films examine the tension and resilience of family bonds, as well
as relationships that endure beyond simple blood ties. Acclaimed Polish
director and cameraman Wojciech Staron captures the
experiences of his family during a one year stay in Argentina in the nuanced
film ARGENTINIAN LESSON. Family
connections are also explored in PRIVATE
UNIVERSE, a richly detailed Czech film by Helena Trestikova that
explores the intimate evolution of a family over four decades of change. While
they are not related by blood, octogenarian best friends Bella and Regina share
a lifetime of intimacy, a passion for cooking and a shared memory of surviving
the Holocaust in the spirited OMA AND
BELLA by German director Alexa Karolinski. Also creating a
family out of friendship are the mentally challenged punk rockers who revel in
their roles as social outcasts in the Finnish film THE PUNK SYNDROME by the directorial team of Jukka Karkkainen and JP
Passi. Attempting to pierce the closed society of evangelical
Christians in the United States, the Swiss/German/French co-production VIRGIN TALES by director Mirjam
Von Arx looks at the phenomenon of Purity Balls, a ritual in which
young girls pledge their pre-marital virginity.

Bringing light to injustice or
changing social patterns are among the themes of the other Euro docs in the
section. In SPECIAL FLIGHT, Swiss
director Fernand Melgar explores the legal limbo of illegal immigrants
in his country who are entrapped in a system of detention, even after living
there for more than a decade. Belgian director Jerome Le Maire focuses
on the societal upheaval in a small mountain village in Morocco where new
technology and the building of a major dam project harbor unwelcome changes in TEA OR ELECTRICITY. In the unusually broad-based eco-documentary VIVAN LAS ANTIPODAS, acclaimed Russian
director Victor Kossakovsky reveals the kinetic and visual splendor of some of
the most remote corners of the planet, all of which are undergoing rapid
changes due to overpopulation and climate change.

European documentaries that have won awards at other events
are also strongly represented in the non-competitive Silver Spectrum section. Directors Omar Shargawi and Karim
el Hakim bring viewers into the heart of the Arab Spring in their
visceral account of the first chaotic days of the Egyptian revolution in the
Danish-financed film ½ REVOLUTION. Denmark
is also represented by the IDFA
winner THE AMBASSADOR, a hilarious
yet pointed look at the underbelly of Third World diplomacy, directed by Danish
provocateur Mads Brugger. In CANNED
DREAMS, Finnish director Katja Gauriloff examines the inner
workings of the global food industry and the exploitation of human laborers
whose rights are held ransom by the need for cheaper food and bigger profits. In
the award-winning THE IMPOSTER, UK
director Bart Layton unfolds the strange-but-true story of a young man
who returns to his family after several years and the growing suspicion that he
is not who he claims to be. Mystery also surrounds the identity of Rodriguez,
a “lost” 1970s rock icon who mysteriously disappeared from public view, and
whose story is unraveled in the Swedish/UK co-production SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN by Malik
Bendjelloul. Sisters Louise and Martine Fokken are
exactly who they claim to be……elderly prostitutes who wield their trade in
Amsterdam’s red light district with no shame and a contempt for society’s
judgmental condemnation of their professions in the Dutch film MEET THE FOKKENS by Rob
Schroder and Gabrielle Provaas.

An obsession with cooking and a chef’s determination to hold on to its Michelin rating fuels the
French film STEP UP TO THE PLATE by Paul
Lacoste. The stakes are equally high in the Norwegian film WHEN BUBBLES BURST by Hans
Petter Moland, as a small picturesque Norwegian village feels the
weight of the global economic crisis that does not spare even a small remote
town in a mostly prosperous nation. As if this list is not enough, European
documentaries also are strongly represented in the Festival’s many short film
strands. One can only hope that this blossoming of the documentary form will
not be unduly harmed by the current financial drama enveloping the
continent……itself a great resource for future documentaries (and dramas, I
might add). To learn more about these films and others at Silverdocs, visit: www.silverdocs.com